St Kents dominate Auckland Regionals for the second year in a row
The Russell McVeagh Auckland Regional Debating Championships were held on the 28th-29th March this year and once again showcased excellent strength in depth for the region. With 28 teams participating, the eight knockout round places were always going to be hotly contested, and a number of talented speakers impressed the judges throughout the rounds despite not quite having enough wins or speaker points to break to the quarter finals.
On the Saturday, debaters competed in four preliminary rounds, debating the merits of banning unvaccinated students from attending public schools, whether gay rights organisations should publicly ‘out’ gay celebrities, whether the government should fully fund tertiary education, and finally whether volountary euthanasia should be legalised.
At the conclusion of these four rounds, St Kentigern College 1 sat atop the team standings with four wins, followed by nine teams all on three wins. This meant that two would miss out on the break on speaker points, with Auckland Diocesan School for Girls and St Cuthbert’s College 2 being the unlucky teams.
The top eight teams returned on Sunday to compete in the knockout rounds. In the quarter finals, on the topic of whether party leaders should be elected by their members or MPs: St Kentigern College 1 beat King’s College 2; Lynfield College beat King’s College 1; St Kentigern College 2 beat Macleans College 1; and Westlake Boys’ High School 1 beat Kristin School.
The semi finals were then held on the motion ‘That this house would offer dictators amnesty in return for stepping down.’ Both St Kent’s 1 and St Kent’s 2 were victorious in their debates against Westlake Boys’ 1 and Lynfield, setting up an all-St Kentigern College final, an impressive achievement for the school and their coaches!
The final saw these teams debating whether STEM subjects in university courses should have places reserved for women, and in a close debate St Kentigern College 1 (Becky Lane, Rachel Worthington, Keshini Ketheeswaran) were the victors, with St Kentigern College 2 (Sarah Courtney, Joshua Looker, Oscar Sims) the runners-up.
The quality of speakers at the tournament was reflected in the need to hold two ‘selection debates’ for the Regional Teams on the Sunday. After much deliberation, the coaches and selectors settled upon six speakers to comprise Auckland’s two teams to attend Nationals and two reserves. The speakers selected were:
Auckland Blue:
Seran Ramanathan (Auckland Grammar School)
Amanda Ngo (King’s College)
Rachel Worthington (St Kentigern College)
Auckland White:
Liam Rawlings (Westlake Boys’ High School)
SooKyung Choi (St Cuthbert’s College)
Karan Kalsi (Lynfield College)
Reserves:
Becky Lane (St Kentigern College)
Zachary Wong (Macleans College)
A number of other individual speaker awards were given out to those students who particularly impressed throughout the tournament:
Best Speaker:
Amanda Ngo (King’s College)
Highly Commended:
Courtney Varney (King’s College)
Amelia Vincent (Kristin School)
Joshua Looker (St Kentigern College)
Most Promising Speaker:
Joshua Looker (St Kentigern College)
James Penn
Convener 2015